Indoctrination

One of my motivations in starting this blog was to counteract the seemingly continual flood of anti-gun (and generally anti-liberty) information flooding the media. I didn't give much thought to the state of the school system, mostly because I had already graduated by the time I started to become politically active.

But the author of the Learning About Guns blog has posted an article highlighting an all-too-common problem: schools which function as indoctrination centers rather than learning institutions.

If you only present one side of the issue, what will your students take away from the class? Particularly if your students are still learning to think critically, and haven't had any significant opportunity to correct their ignorance on a specific topic? Obviously, as students under 18 in Illinois, buying a firearm and learning to shoot outside of a family of shooters or hunters is unusual if not illegal.

It doesn't help much to have a teacher try to learn the other side of the issue in a few days to try to counter the arguments of an experienced speaker. It may be better than nothing, but it might also serve to convince students that the gun rights arguments aren't compelling. A particular risk is that an inexperienced pro-gun speaker might not be able to effectively challenge the lies and misrepresentations that are common practice from the (so-called) Million Moms.

If you find yourself wondering where our nation is headed...

Maybe Redding was a bad kid with a track record of disciplinary
problems? Well, no, she wasn?t. In fact, before the strip search [for prescription-strength ibuprofen - ed], she
had no record of disciplinary problems at all. When her lawyers
pointed this out in court documents, the district acknowledged the lack
of a disciplinary record, but said that the inference should have been
that she?d just been masterful at avoiding getting caught. They also
defended themselves by claiming to have heard rumors that Redding had
drunk alcohol at a party, but the court documents show that the person
starting the rumor hadn?t attended the event.

This is the result of rule by bureaucrat. When misbehavior by government officials has no consequences, misbehavior becomes the norm. And horrors like this are visited anywhere their writ extends.

National Service: Not Mandatory, Yet

I haven't seen a lot of news coverage about the Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education Act (GIVE), but it passed the House last Wednesday. Over at the E3 Gazette, there's an analysis of the bill and what it proposes. I won't excerpt anything except the title: Is "Arbeit Macht Free" too strong? We had best hope that we can stop this in the Senate.

Employer parking lot bill in Texas

A lot of people have mixed feelings on this legislation, because it does limit property rights somewhat. I support it, because large corporations would much rather play it safe and ban firearms when it's not their own life at risk.